


Dead Zone

by NeverwinterThistle



Category: The Magnus Archives (Podcast)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Space, Artificial Intelligence, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-06-21
Updated: 2018-06-21
Packaged: 2019-04-30 09:13:48
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 8,663
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14493696
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/NeverwinterThistle/pseuds/NeverwinterThistle
Summary: Statement of Emma Marino, regarding transmissions received during routine courier runs through a Destabilising Electromagnetic Disruption Zone, colloquially referred to as a DED, or ‘dead’ Zone.The universe is vast, and full of contradictions.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

  * For [spacehopper](https://archiveofourown.org/users/spacehopper/gifts).



> I loved your request for A SPACE SETTING! Your prompts were an absolute pleasure to write for, thank you.

The Magnus Institute was once referred to as a blacklight house on a still and silent frontier; a Pandora’s box of the eerie and esoteric; the place where mysteries go to hide. The scholar who made this comparison proceeded to disappear. His remains were found in an offworld museum, where records show that he was taxidermied and displayed some thirty years before he was actually born.

The universe is vast, and full of contradictions.

Jon has found documents which tell him that the Institute is hundreds of years old. Others say thousands, tens of thousands, longer still. A recent file placed its date of inception as the day before yesterday; this, he assumes, is Tim’s idea of a joke. A sort of ‘haze the unpopular boss’ thing. Jon destroyed the file and assigned Tim to researching meteorological patterns on Rehua 17, which only achieved colony status a year ago and therefore suffers from an unsurprising lack of publicly available data. As revenge goes, it’s small and petty. But it has granted Jon a few days of uninterrupted peace and quiet.

Elias tells him he should make an effort to socialise with the assistants. To engage in teambuilding activities; cocktails in the restaurant quarter on floor 2B, or zero-grav football in floor 9’s leisure centre, or bingo evenings in the Institute library.  And, being Elias, he makes these recommendations with a perturbed, benevolent expression, as though he genuinely believes Jon might find them helpful, his graceful hands steepled on his desk.

But seeing as Elias is not, as it turns out, a man at all, Jon doesn’t consider himself bound by any of these suggestions.

From the wide window of his office, he can see the stars.


	2. Chapter 2

**[Statement log #30170325. Archivist status verified: Welcome, Jonathan Sims.]**

[CLICK]

**ARCHIVIST**

Statement of Emma Marino, regarding transmissions received during routine courier runs through a Destabilising Electromagnetic Disruption Zone, colloquially referred to as a DED, or ‘dead’ Zone. Original statement given March 25th, 3017, standard date. Audio recording by Jonathan Sims, Head Archivist of the Magnus Institute, Kepler-90 System.

Statement begins.

**ARCHIVIST (STATEMENT)**

There’s a lot of superstition surrounding dead zones. I suppose that’s understandable; most people don’t like feeling totally cut off from the rest of humanity. I mean, that’s why we’re all hooked up to the network, isn’t it? Instant information beamed right into your brain. Talk to anyone, anywhere, and however distant your little dump of a colony is, you can still call your grandma up on her birthday.

We are all connected. It’s part of what makes us humanity. And I think that’s why so many people find the concept of a dead zone so terrifying; it’s…well, it’s dead, isn’t it? But it’s not going anywhere, and if you want to get your parcels and documents and artefacts and deceased relatives or whatever delivered in less than thousands of years, then you’re sending the courier through a dead zone. No visibility. No communications. No human contact. All you have is the silence, and the trust that your onboard AI will sail you through to the other side.

Honestly, I’ve never minded. I’m something of an introvert, and something of an adventurer; the thought of passing through an area in space that no one understands, and no one wants to linger in, is thrilling to me. Sometimes I shut my autopilot off and do the navigation manually. Not too often, of course, and the AI knows to take over if I deviate too much. I’m not stupid. But I like the feeling of facing down the unknown all by myself. I feel like an explorer in days gone by. Like one of the pioneers that first set foot out among the stars.

Or, I did. Now I’m not sure what to feel. I’ve gone very quiet where my feelings should be.

It started with a standard courier run. Inter-planetary system delivery, so obviously that includes a bit of time off the radar. The package itself wasn’t anything exciting; some wealthy entrepreneur on a business trip sending exotics to his fiancé back home. Flowers, sweets, love letters. I do a lot of that.

It’s funny when you think about it; my ancestors spent so many thousands of years trapped on one small blue-and-green planet, and then suddenly we have space travel and colonies and the network. We’re expanding, civilising, developing the untouched. Always pushing for new frontiers. People can hop thousands of light years across the cosmos in the space of weeks. But they’re busy, so they’d rather pay me to courier letters home for them. Slower than communicating over the network, but paper has way more sentimental value. And that’s how I make my living. Sentiment.

So you could say that I see a lot of the dead zones; I pass through at least once a week, and I’ve never been superstitious. They’re just places, like any other. And I don’t believe in ghosts.

Which is why I got a real fright when my AI woke me up midway through a standard trip.

I’d given her control and reclined my seat to take a nap, because however much mystique people try to attach to them, dead zones aren’t actually very interesting to pass through. There’s nothing to look at; your windows are sealed to keep the ship from exploding. And even if they weren’t, there would literally be nothing to see. No stars, no suns, no anything. Just a lot of passing the time with naps. Which was what I was doing when I was woken up without warning by my AI-

Look, I’m just going to use her name, alright? All this _my AI_ business is doing my head in; no pilot actually talks like that, whatever the manufacturers say about _the dangers of anthropomorphising a computer programme, blah, blah, blah_. We all give them names, and we use them, and mine’s Beatrice.  So that’s what I’m going to call her.

Anyway, Beatrice woke me up to tell me that we’d received a communication from some unknown source. And first I think, okay, I’m still asleep, this is a dream. And then I thought maybe I’d slept longer than I meant to, and we’d made the jump back into normal space. But we still had days of travel to go, and I’m not that much of a heavy sleeper.

And then she said it again: **Emma, I have received a communication from an unidentified source.**

Well, as you know, that’s just not possible. Dead zone, no life. No…mystery communications. And I was still a bit bleary from sleep, so I just sort of lay there blinking at the ceiling for a bit, and then I told her to play the message. Didn’t really sink in what a momentous occasion it might be, or how I could make a _lot_ of money off this if it was real. I was tired. I wanted to go back to sleep.

She got really quiet for a second, and I wondered if she was having to decompress a file or something. But then she said, **I have registered an inadvisable course of action. Do you still wish to proceed?**

Now, it’s not strange for an onboard AI to say that. It’s default AI-speak for, “you’re a goddamn idiot and I’m trying to save you from yourself.” Generally something you want to listen to. But this time it just didn’t make sense; she was the one who’d woken me up with this message. She was the one who received it in the first place. And now all of a sudden she didn’t want me to hear it? It didn’t make sense. And I actually made a note of it in my log: _note to self, get Beatrice debugged._ Because she clearly wasn’t feeling like herself, and maybe I shouldn’t have kept delaying those important security updates as long as I did. And obviously, I told her to play the message. Who wouldn’t?

It was weird at first. It came through the ship’s speakers, all around me, like it was right there with me. Crackling, at first. A whole lot of static. Bit like you get with a solar flare that briefly disrupts your network connection. Crackle, crackle, mumble, mumble. Nothing coherent. But underneath all that, I could definitely hear words. I just couldn’t make them out; it was like standing next to someone who’s speaking a foreign language, and it’s just similar enough to your own that you can make out the individual words, and you’re _so_ sure that comprehension is just a second or two away. But it’s not. You don’t know what they’re saying. You have no idea.

 **Message repeats indefinitely** , Beatrice told me. **Would you like to continue?**

I did. Because it was a mystery, a bit of real adventure, and I was going to be stuck in the dead zone for days anyway. And because I was so _certain_ that, somewhere under the static, there was a human talking. I couldn’t shake off the feeling that if I listened to it long enough, I’d start to understand.

She played it for hours.

I sort of dozed off after a while. I was tired, I was bored, I could only spend so long straining my ears to try and make sense of what was probably the auditory equivalent of dust on a camera lens. I sort of gave up and drifted into that bleary state between asleep and awake, where everything is a bit muddled and your brain is only pretending to do work. I was on the edge of losing consciousness. And that’s when it all made sense. Suddenly, I could make out the words.

_In space, no one can hear you._

I shot upright so fast I almost blacked out for a second. My vision swam, and I clung to my seat for balance, but the words were still there.

_In space, no one can hear you._

I can’t…quite describe what it sounded like. I’ve put a lot of thought into it. Not obviously male or female. Not even especially human; there was something artificial about how the vowels and consonants were strung together, a sort of unevenness, like one of those blackmail letters from old movies, made from cut out and pasted newspaper scraps. Random capital letters and uneven spacing, you know? It sounded just like that.

“Beatrice,” I said, “did you get that too?” Only, as soon as I spoke, the words cut out. Everything went quiet.

 **Communication terminated,** Beatrice told me. **All attempts to make a recording resulted in failure. My apologies.**

I admit, I got angry with her. She’d sounded just a little bit smug- and don’t try to tell me AI don’t have moods, because any pilot who’s spent long enough with theirs will say otherwise. She hadn’t wanted me to hear it in the first place, and as soon as I’d made sense of it she cut off the communication. And as for failing to make a recording- don’t make me laugh. At the time I was positive she’d done it on purpose. I know better now.

Anyway, I made my delivery, got paid, didn’t get tipped for my trouble. And I knew I should have stopped by a repair shop for a virus scan or something, but by that point the whole thing had become a lot less serious in my mind.

I think I’d decided it was a prank. I have a lot of friends in the courier business; we have our favourite bars on our favourite planets or stations, and we meet to whine about customers or weird deliveries, or share black market software. This isn’t a high-paying profession, you know? I can’t always afford a legitimate license for a programme that makes my navigation a little more accurate, or updates my takeoff routines to use less fuel. And sometimes there might be an artist I want to listen to, except that I happen to be in a system that adds extra tax to music sales, and a friend of mine has a slightly less legitimate copy that she got from _her_ friend…yeah. Lots of that going on in the courier business. So I wondered if someone had slipped me a little extra, as a joke. It seemed a bit off-colour, but couriers tend to be…socially inept. Kind of like you lot, here at the Institute.

I shrugged it off and took another job. And then, the next time I was in dead space, it happened again.

**Emma, I have received a communication from an unidentified source.**

“Again?” I said. “Is it the same as last time?” It took Beatrice several seconds to reply, which isn’t like her at all.

 **Emma, I have received a communication from an unidentified** -.

Repetition also wasn’t like her. I cut her off, asked her if she’d heard me the first time. She didn’t reply at all. Gave me the silent treatment until I caved in and told her just to play the damn message then. Which she did.

_In space, no one can hear you._

It was easier to make out this time. Almost like the fuzz had been reduced, like before we hadn’t quite been tuned in to the same wavelength the message was broadcasting on, and now we’d managed to pinpoint it. Or maybe it was the other way around. Maybe it had found us.

“That’s so weird,” I said to Beatrice. “Don’t you think that’s weird?”

She lagged again. I think it took her almost five seconds to reply, which really wasn’t like her; she’s a chatty one when she wants to be, especially when she decides I haven’t filled my quota of social interaction for the day. She also nags me if I don’t eat my vegetables, so. That’s my standard Beatrice. Only, not so standard, because I’d never known her to take so long to reply.

 **I am attempting to trace the origin of this communication** , she told me **.** **It is proving difficult.**

“What’s the problem?” I asked her. “Is there no source? Or is it too nearby?” By this point I was pretty sold on the idea that we had a virus on board, and I was already making a list of possible culprits. I know there are programmes that can mess with your communications array and make it self-generate messages that the AI can’t pinpoint, either because it can’t see any source, or because the source is too close; like someone pinning something to the back of your coat, so you keep spinning around looking for it, but you can’t see anything. I thought that might be the case here. The message might be coming from _us_.

 **There is a source** , Beatrice told me. **It is not nearby. It-it-it-it-**

She stuttered. She couldn’t seem to shake it off, looping back on herself in an uncomfortable rhythm that grated on my nerves. It was like listening to the clicking of a dying hard drive. It-it-it-it-it. And in the background, the message, with its quiet undercurrent of static.

I ended up taking manual control and rebooting her in safe mode. She came right back to life, sounding a lot more like herself; the weird message stopped when I shut her down, of course. She can’t access the communications array in safe mode, seeing as it cuts her off from the network. So she couldn’t start playing it again. I asked her if she was alright.

 **System did not shut down properly** , she told me, kind of reproachfully. **Performing system health checks.**

I asked her if she’d managed to pinpoint the source of the message.

She hesitated again. Five seconds, ten, and then she replied. **I can’t hear,** she said. **There is no space.**

 **It is vast** , she said.

When we got back into normal space, I sent out a whole lot of very angry messages to anyone I’d accepted software from within the last few months. I admit, I was probably a bit more abrasive than I needed to be. So it wasn’t all that surprising at first when nobody replied; lots of people would be in their own dead zones, running deliveries. And most of us aren’t very good at dealing with aggressive confrontation. Getting the silent treatment was to be expected, for a few days.

It was a bit weird, though. By the time I picked up my next delivery and hopped sideways into com silence, I still hadn’t received any replies. It was like they’d never got my messages at all.

**Emma, I have received a communication from an unidentified source.**

No surprises there.

The message played for a little while, but I got bored faster this time. I told Beatrice to stop it. Had to ask her several times, because she was lagging again and didn’t reply. Finally, I asked her if she’d gone deaf. If she was listening.

 **No, Emma** , she said. **In space, no one can hear you.**

I got a bit freaked out, I’ll admit, and I actually started reaching for the manual override controls, because no one in their right mind wants a faulty AI at the helm. Especially not in a dead zone. But before I could touch anything, the message stopped playing, and Beatrice was talking normally, reading out our estimated ETA and updating me on the state of our cargo. She sounded a little bleary at first, like she’d just woken up from a nap. But that faded, and by the end of her little spiel she was normal again.

I completed my delivery and took her straight to one of my favourite repair shops. Splashed out more cash than I could rightly afford, just to get a full screening and system update. All the little security patches I’d put off for months, all the new drivers, got my communications systems re-tuned, and I had them wipe my hard drives of anything except my personal files and the delivery logs I’m legally required to keep for ten standard years after the fact. And those are harmless.

I made damn sure they knew what I wanted. It was very loud in the shop; I was shouting at my programmer just to be heard, and he was still having trouble, so in the end I wrote it all down for him. And then I watched while he did it. I made sure he followed my instructions. In between checking the network for replies to the demand I’d sent out to my friends; I was still sitting on a grand total of zero responses, and that wasn’t right. But I sort of put it all on the backburner. I figured if there was a problem with communications, my mechanic would find it. So I watched him like a hawk.

What I’m saying is, there wasn’t a virus. But the next time I hit dead space, nothing had changed.

This time Beatrice didn’t ask me if I wanted to listen. She just started playing the message, same as last time. She didn’t seem to hear me when I told her not to bother. And it was exactly the same as before; maybe a little sharper, a little clearer. _In space, no one can hear you._ Not loud or anything, just…there. Like the background hum of an engine. I was too angry to take over the manual piloting; I’d paid a lot of money to get Beatrice cleaned up, and here she was, still broken. I kicked my chair into recline, dimmed the lights, and sulked.

I think I dozed off for a bit. I know I wasn’t fully conscious, because I didn’t immediately realise something had changed. It took me a while. I lay there trying to work out what was wrong, staring up at the lights and panels on the roof of my cockpit. And then I realised what was wrong: there was an overlap in the message, an echo occurring just a fraction of a second behind it.

Beatrice was repeating what it said. Over and over again, very quietly. I could only just hear her over the pounding of my own heart.

“Stop it,” I told her. “Please stop, this isn’t funny.” I didn’t actually think she’d listen- I wasn’t sure if she _could_ \- but she did. For a second or two, at least. Then she started up again, but it wasn’t right. It wasn’t the same. She seemed to have glitched somehow, so that instead of repeating the entire message, she was stuck juggling words into patterns, trying to make sense of them.

**One space can hear in you no no no**

**In one space no can no**

**No space hear you no**

**Can you hear?**

**No one in space.**

**Can you hear?**

It was at that point that I felt the ship give a shudder. Did I scream? I think I might have; I’m not sure. Because, even though my little single-person courier ship isn’t built for joyriding through asteroid fields, it can handle a bit of a bump. Any ship can. But this wasn’t right, this was happening in a dead zone. There shouldn’t have been anything there. It should have been empty.

And it was. Because the jolt hadn’t been us running into anything – if we had, we would have been torn apart. No, that jolt had been Beatrice yanking the ship out of its navigational alignment, taking it off the pre-programmed coordinates. We were free flying.

And I wasn’t in control.

I went into a panic. I remember pushing buttons, typing commands, reciting passwords and trying to access the manual flight overrides. But Beatrice wasn’t having any of it; she was supposed to scan my fingerprints and eyes, do a DNA match with a strand of hair, the usual procedure for a forced override against the AI’s wishes. But she just…wouldn’t do it. The scanners wouldn’t start up. The only thing I could access was the digital depiction of our flight path, and what I saw made no sense.

It’s…hard to explain a dead zone to someone who’s never been in one. Have you? Maybe you have, but even so; a tourist wouldn’t understand. You think about distances in terms of measurements and logical pathways and obeying the laws of physics. But nobody understands dead zones, and while I wouldn’t say that physics don’t apply, I’m certain no one knows exactly _what_ physics are at work there. It’s not like some planetary highway where you keep to the road and get to your destination. It’s not that simple.

But all the same, there are paths. We calculate them, follow them, and we don’t deviate much. Because the dead zone can’t be explored. Or, if it can, nobody who’s tried has ever come back. Maybe they ran into black holes, or got sucked into gravitational pulls from suns they never even saw. Maybe they just kept travelling until they realised they couldn’t come back. There’s a lot of empty in a dead zone; or maybe that’s just the parts we’ve found so far.

I’d know soon enough. That’s where Beatrice was taking me.

 **No space** _,_ she was whispering _._ **No space. No space. No. No. No.**

And the entire time she was doing this, that goddamn message was still repeating in the background; I’d forgotten it was there, in my panic. It blended into the background with the sounds of the ship itself, so that it seemed a logical part of the walls. So that it seemed as much a part of me as my terrified breathing, or my racing heart.

_In space, no one can hear you._

I couldn’t do anything. I was afraid, I was helpless, I was falling into a darkness without end. And I couldn’t do anything.

_In space, no one can hear you._

I think I might have cried. I’m sure I must have. I don’t know how long it was for; I don’t think I made any sound.

_In space, no one can hear you._

In the end, I just gave up. I sat back in my chair and pulled the flight path up onto the main screens, and I gave up. Let it take me then, I thought. One last adventure. What does it matter, anyway? What do I have to lose?

And then, without warning, we lurched again. The shields which protect a ship’s windows from exploding while in a dead zone retracted; my location sensors updated themselves. My communications were back online. I looked outside.

I saw a star, planets, too many moons to count. And I saw a space station.

It was medium sized, by inter-planetary standards. More elegant than most, but nothing ostentatious. It hung in the habitable zone of its planetary system, buzzing with ship traffic; cargo freighters, passenger vessels, courier ships like mine. Engraved large on its convex roof was the outline of a birdlike creature. I don’t know what it was.

The station was already broadcasting a welcome to me. I was directed to the hangar.

But you know this. You were the one who came to meet me when I landed. You brought me into this room and gave me some paper and a pen, and you said to me:

“Make your statement, Ms Marino.”

You’re not very good with people, are you, Mister Sims? For starters, I’m not a _Ms_. I command a ship, which makes me a _Captain._ And it would have been polite to offer me some tea, or a medical evaluation; I know I look terrible. But maybe you’re used to that. Maybe you think it’s strange when people come here and _aren’t_ terrified out of their wits. Still, though. You could have answered my questions instead of ignoring me, with that prissy little scowl on your face. You could have tried not to sound like my presence was an imposition to you. It’s not like you’re even in the room with me.

I thought about asking if I could stay; I’m half way to my delivery, and the only way to complete it without travelling in normal space for thousands of years is to dip into a dead zone. I know what will happen if I do that. I know I’m not coming back.

But there’s a part of me that doesn’t know, and wants to. What’s out there? Where was Beatrice taking me? The scientists talk about supermassive black holes and unknown gravitational pulls and who knows what else. But the adventurers say different. They’re all full of legends. Like that old Earth myth, El Dorado, or that city buried under the waves, what was it called?

Maybe there’s a whole new kind of space. New universes, galaxies, suns and stars and _people_. Maybe we’ll finally discover those aliens we’ve been searching for even since before we could leave our little Earth.

Or maybe there’s just the dead zone. Vast and dark and empty, swallowing up my little ship while I starve to death inside.

Either way, I know I have to leave. You won’t even talk to me, let alone help. I’m not sure you listened to anything I said to you.

Can you hear me?

**ARCHIVIST**

Statement ends.

Our researchers checked Ms… _Captain_ Marino’s ship before it departed. We’ve taken copies of its recorded flight paths and communications history and found nothing out of the ordinary. Several virus checks were employed, and I suspect the Institute’s security tools are a little more top of the line than whatever cheap mechanic did the last set of scans. Still, we found nothing. Which suggests that there was never anything to find.

Captain Marino was not offered a place to stay at the Institute; not only does this go against standard policy, but we are a place of research and learning, not a hotel. Not to mention that I would have had to ask Elias for an exemption to accommodate her, and quite frankly, I would prefer not to.

We did however inform the Captain that we would research her case, and that she should feel free to update us should she encounter any further inexplicable occurrences. We also promised to look into any reports of similar messages received while in a dead zone. And good luck to us with _that_.

Irritatingly enough, even the nomenclature is unreliable. The term Destabilising Electromagnetic Disruption Zone is in fact a holdover from a disproved theory as to what causes the network disruption. Science has long since moved on; Melanie informs me that the current theoretical consensus is, and I quote, “Nobody bloody knows.” But the name has resisted all efforts at updating itself, probably because the average citizen can’t resist the little thrill of uneducated terror they get from uttering the phrase “dead zone”. Such is the burden of the scientist and researcher.

In all honesty, I think we can safely file this one away in the “hoax” section. The stereotypes surrounding couriers exist for a reason; the job itself is highly damaging to mental health, and the people who choose it as a career are not very well adjusted, socially. They spend so much time in isolation, talking to their onboard AI systems, and then to themselves…well. It’s not difficult to see what Captain Marino’s problem is. She certainly didn’t seem all that sociable while she was here; from the moment of landing to her subsequent departure, she didn’t utter a single word.

End recording.

[CLICK]

[CLICK]

Supplemental.

Captain Marino’s statement has been troubling me. I asked Martin to keep an ear out for her progress, and to report back when she reached her destination and completed her delivery. She was expected three standard days ago. She has not arrived, and is now outside the expected delivery window, meaning she forfeits a third of her payment. According to her records, she has never missed a deadline before. All attempts to communicate with her vessel have proven unsuccessful. Wherever she is, she can’t hear us. Or maybe we can’t hear her.

I’ve been trying to work out why her story bothers me far more than some of the other, more gruesome statements that have made their way across my desk.

 The problem lies with her AI. Her…Beatrice.

Assuming (and note that this is a highly unlikely conjecture, and one which I am entertaining hypothetically, and not in my capacity as Head Archivist), just assuming that her story is true, then it is a cause for great concern. Artificial intelligence is advanced enough to be immune to most hijacking attempts; it’s been a very long time since we had to worry about malicious programming taking control of our systems. It’s all in the name, isn’t it? AI units are intelligent, to a point. They know when someone is trying to hack them. And even if they didn’t, can a _message_ cause that level of data corruption? A virus shouldn’t be compatible with a courier ship’s simplistic communications array. It shouldn’t be possible.

That being said, it also shouldn’t be possible for an AI to pass convincingly as human for decades without causing the slightest bit of suspicion, and yet Elias managed it. So perhaps I should be a little more cautious before declaring a thing impossible. Clearly, I don’t know nearly enough about these things.

[FRUSTRATED SIGH]

Alright, fine. I am…troubled by the ease with which Beatrice was taken over. That, and the fact that she clearly had some idea that the broadcast was dangerous, given that she tried to dissuade Captain Marino from playing it. Was the damage done from the moment it first began to play? Were they doomed from the beginning? Was there nothing either of them could have done to save themselves? What… _happened_? Where did it come from?

And assuming it was some kind of deliberate attack, what’s to stop its creator from trying the same thing here? Because as it turns out, the entire Institute is run at the beck and call of an AI. Are we at risk? Is he…at risk?

I need to talk to Elias about our security systems. _His_ security systems. I can’t put it off any longer.

End supplemental.

[CLICK]


	3. Chapter 3

The door to Elias’ office opens with a soft hydraulic hiss. Jon steps inside.

Elias is waiting.

“Good evening, Jon,” he says, looking up from the ubiquitous pile of paperwork. Ever the status symbol; in a universe where life is conducted primarily in digital form, very few people can justify the extra cost of using real paper, which degrades and decays and requires extra precautions to maintain, not to mention the effort to digitise it. And yet Elias’ desk is never to be seen bare of its ostentatious paperwork. The cost of maintenance must be ridiculous.

But then, maybe Elias balances the ledger by not bothering to pay himself a wage. He is, after all, not human.

“This is unexpected,” Elias comments. “I rather thought I’d have to endure at least a few more weeks of silent treatment. To what do I owe the pleasure?” He sets his pen down and waits, hands folded on the desk in front of him. He blinks at correct intervals. He breathes. He gives every appearance of authenticity.

Jon doesn’t like to look at him. He doesn’t like how it makes him feel.

“I’m not here for long,” he says to the window over Elias’ shoulder. Kepler-90’s light is growing dim, artificially faded out as the station initiates sunset mode at a time considered suitable for the human circadian rhythm. Soon, the ‘night’ sky will dominate, sans its primary star, at least until false dawn.

The window’s angle gives a startling view of the two gas giants, looming deceptively, silent and huge. Jon feels a brief stab of envy. His own office is on a lower level, and faces a less…distracting part of the system. No planets in his window, no swirling celestial mass to lose himself in contemplating. Only the distant gleams of stars and separate systems.

He wonders if Elias ever turns to appreciate the view. If he even _can_.

There is a silence stretching out between them. Jon has never been one to mind silences; still, he minds this one. It’s awkward. Heavy with his resentment, and Elias’ forced patience. Heavy with the questions Jon is not allowed to ask.

Eventually, Elias sighs. He indicates the chair opposite his desk. “Sit, Jon,” he says. “If we’re going to have it out, you might as well be comfortable. You look exhausted. When did you last sleep?”

“Don’t pretend you don’t already know. You can see everything that happens on this station; aren’t you the…the _heart of the Institute_?” Still, he’s right, probably because he has been watching Jon, and knows exactly how much he does or doesn’t sleep. Resentfully, Jon takes the chair. It moulds itself around him, flexing and dipping to fit the shape of his shoulders and spine. He leans forward, pulling away from the synthetic memory-leather.

“I know you feel uncomfortable around me,” Elias says. His tone is soft, reasonable. Jon finds his eyes dipping to follow the movements of his lips, the momentary glimpses of teeth and tongue. He’s so real. So convincing. That makes the whole thing worse, somehow. It would have been better if the falsehood was easier to spot.

“I can’t imagine why that would be,” Jon says coldly. He’s both gratified and irritated to see the fractional tightening around Elias’ eyes.

“I find it hard to believe you’re that troubled by the murders,” Elias says. “You and I have both seen far worse in our time here, and I think you’re starting to understand why they were necessary. At least enough to allow me the benefit of doubt. Which suggests that the problem is less to do with the things I have done, and more to do with the nature of my existence. I am not quite as human as you thought.”

“You’re not human at all,” Jon snaps. “Having a, a _donor body_ doesn’t make you any less artificial.” He grips the edge of Elias’ desk, leaning forward. “And you’ll forgive me for doubting you when you claim the body was surrendered with consent. None of the information I’ve managed to find about the original Elias Bouchard suggests that he was the type to leave his body to a…a malevolent AI overlord.”

Elias gives a brief, incredulous laugh. “ _Malevolent AI overlord_? Honestly, Jon, don’t you think you might be exaggerating?”

It is very tempting to lean a little further and hit him. Just to try it. To _see_ if he bleeds like a real man, if he can simulate pain, if he’ll smear his blood across Jon’s knuckles and paint the back of his hand in bright, barbaric red. If he’d do that, for Jon’s sake.

Jon doesn’t know if he wants the answer.

“My _boss_ recently admitted to being an artificial personality uploaded into a possibly unconsenting human body,” he says quietly. “Which he has used to commit two murders so far _that I know of_. Does any part of that strike you as exaggeration?”

“Still,” Elias says. “I dispute the _malevolent_. As I have told you on several occasions: I do what I must out of necessity. The necessity of keeping you uninformed, until such a time as you are ready for answers. Of keeping you sane, until your mind is ready to be extended. Of preparing you for challenges that would destroy almost anyone else. My motivations run contrary to any dictionary definition I can find for the word ‘malevolent’. You are of course free to disagree, and I await your evidence with bated breath. Any form of referencing is acceptable. Your choice.”

“I don’t-” Jon stops, makes himself slow down. He’s never at his best when angry; he gets sloppy, careless. It’s always been an issue, but Elias makes it so much worse. He needles. He makes digs that get under Jon’s armour and burrow their spines into tender flesh. And linger. Elias strikes where it hurts.

He can do that. He’s not human enough to feel guilt. And whatever he might claim about his motivations, whatever his reasoning, he is not to be trusted. Because he _lied_.

“I’m not here to let you distract me,” Jon says, when he rediscovers the ability to talk. “I just came to ask about…about security.”

Elias raises his eyebrows. “The Institute’s?” he asks. “I can assure you, there’s nothing to worry about there. I would tell you that an attack would have to get through me first, but I’m afraid I just can’t match your flair for the…dramatic. So I’ll settle for saying that, yes, we are secure.”

“What about you?” Jon pursues. “I have a statement on my desk that features an onboard AI apparently being corrupted by some kind of outside influence. I didn’t even realise it was possible; I’m sure you know more about that than I. Are _you_ …” he hesitates. Looks for the right word and, when he finds it, also finds that he doesn’t particularly want to say it.

Elias saves him the trouble. “Safe?” he suggests. His tone is abruptly, cloyingly gentle. “I am. And I appreciate your concern; it’s very touching.”

“It’s not though, is it? It’s not anything to you. You’re not human.”

“The body I inhabit is certainly human enough to make the question a murky one-”

“No,” Jon barks at him, with a volume that startles them both. He leans forward, furious. He must make quite a sight; quite a mess, a _human_ mess, when compared to Elias’ artificial stillness. “I don’t want to hear about your loopholes. You’re not human, and you lied about it, presumably so none of us could come up with a clever plan to shut you down.”

Elias watches him warily. “Gertrude tried,” he says. “But you know what happened to her. As to the rest- Jon. Really. I have never lied to you. You simply assumed, and you were mistaken.”

“Yes, just because I don’t immediately stop to ask people, “ _are you actually human?_ ” as soon as I meet them-”

“And would it matter if you had?” Elias asks. He’s still using that terrible, gentle tone. One of his hands stretches across the desk, stopping just short of Jon’s. A request, or maybe an offer. Jon can’t begin to understand what is wanted of him. He doesn’t move.

_Yes_ , he thinks, _it would have mattered_. But even inside the relative safety of his own mind, the thought rings a little hollow.

He’s been at the Institute less than a decade; came to it fresh with a meaningless university degree from the distant homeworld he doesn’t miss, accepted after his first digital interview with an austere man whose eyes were as dark as the spaces between stars. And despite his complaints (insufficient assistants, Martin, awful synth-coffee, hoax statements and hopeless subjects), Jon has known from the start that he would never leave this place. The Institute. The Archives. They’re his, as much as he is theirs.

And he knows the Institute is not just the place of research it appears to be. Rather, it’s a repository, a vessel for an entity that sees too much and still doesn’t see enough. The thing that claimed him. And Elias too; the thing that allows him to exist in his current, impossible state. Chips of metal for a mind, housing the secrets Jon is not allowed to access.

But he would have taken the job, if he’d known from the start. Of course he would. What were his alternatives? Personal assistant, receptionist, teacher, scholar? Not him. No.

More to the point, he would have taken the job because the thing that calls itself the Eye would not have allowed him to refuse. And however frightening the… _AI_ aspect of Elias, he is not the true master of this place, any more than Jon is. Just one more follower with more curiosity than sense, and a hunger all the information in the universe cannot sate.

Jon looks down at the desk. Elias’ hand is where he left it; extended towards his own, not quite touching him. Would it have mattered, if he’d known from the start? If the calm, distant man who asked the questions and nodded at his answers, whose measured smile gave him a greater sense of triumph than his graduation two days previously- if he’d known. Would it have mattered?

_No_ , Jon thinks, resigned. _If anything, I’d have been that much more eager._ He’s never been good at knowing when to leave well enough alone.

From the corner of his eye, he sees the small smile on Elias’ face. Silent acknowledgement of victory. Smug bastard.

“I’m so glad we could resolve this little issue of yours,” he says serenely. “I trust it won’t come up again in the future.”

“Oh, it will,” Jon can’t help but say. “But I’ll try to make sure it doesn’t inconvenience you. I know you’re busy. Budget reviews and…taxes.”

“Laugh if you must, but intergalactic tax law is a field the Institute cannot afford to overlook. Not if you want me to approve your request for an upgrade in staff coffee rations, at least.” Finally, Elias moves his outstretched hand. He covers one of Jon’s, rubbing a gentle thumb over his knuckles. And then releasing him.

Jon fights the urge to flex his hand. There’s a phantom tingle to it; almost, but not quite like electricity.

He doesn’t dare look Elias in the face.

“Will you tell me?” he asks. And he’s been so careful to avoid compelling unintentionally, but surely the circumstances allow for it. It’s not like he’s asking for anything Elias might consider important. He puts a thread of force into his tone. “If you feel something starting to interfere with your programming, some outside force that wants to…to change you. Will you tell me?”

“Yes,” Elias says immediately. “I will.”

“Right. Good. Thank you.” Jon pushes himself to his feet. He feels heavier somehow; a weight that feels a little like disappointment, like guilt, like resignation. Like this whole meeting has achieved nothing other than making him feel worse than he already did.

He’s half way to the door when he hears Elias sigh.

“I see I miscalculated,” he says to Jon’s back. “I’d assumed I was reassuring you. But that’s not the case here, is it?”

Jon manages a dry, humourless laugh. “Not really, no.”

“Forgive me. Much of my software is still calibrated to Gertrude’s personality and preferences; it takes a while to learn a new Archivist. Decades, even. You’re all such…complex creatures.”

“I don’t want to hear it.”

“Why not?” Jon turns as he hears Elias’ chair push back on the carpeted floor; lab-produced synthetic fibres, softer than velvet. They render Elias’ footsteps almost silent as he approaches.

He stops just a little too close for comfort. Pristine, as ever; clothes well-pressed, in a way Jon has never been able to master; the green of his tie adds a suggestion of colour to his otherwise opaque eyes. And somewhere under his tidy hair, the tidy scars where his skull was cut open, segments of brain matter removed and replaced with silvery metal hardware.

Once again, he takes Jon’s hand. His are warmer; a by-product of his office, no doubt, which is definitely a more comfortable temperature than Jon’s own. Jon considers pulling away. Making a break for the door, which will not open if Elias doesn’t want it to. Or trying to find somewhere to hide behind, like a child avoiding his scolding.

He doesn’t. Elias has warm hands and a wistful expression, and he feels so deceptively real. He always has. That’s the problem.

“You should want to know, Jon,” Elias tells him. “Take the information I am offering you; there are very few things in this universe that I am at liberty to explain to you, fully and without reserve. This is one of them.” He tugs Jon’s hand, pulling it up to his cheek, his ear, his hair. He guides Jon’s fingers to the edges of several cold, artificial depressions in the back of his skull.

Jon is fascinated despite himself. Unbidden, he traces the flat metal caps, sealed shut, that will open at Elias’ order and allow him a means of physical connection into the Institute itself. Ports through which the Beholding can touch him directly, in a way it can’t reach normal humans. Frail electronics filling the small pits in his skull, sticking to his brain like strands of thread. Parasite membranes in a helpless host. Even sealed as they are, Jon pictures them and shivers. He touches. It’s a shockingly intimate thing; his mind wants to reject the sensation. _This is not correct_ , it wants to tell him. _This is not right, this is uncanny_.

This is, he realises, Elias demonstrating trust. Something a machine should not be capable of.

“Does it hurt?” he hears himself asking, as his fingers feel their way around the cool, circular depressions hidden under Elias’ hair. “Did it hurt?”

“Not at all,” Elias says. “I didn’t feel a thing.”

“No,” Jon agrees. “You wouldn’t. I suppose you never do.”

“Jon.” Elias has a hand at his jaw, tilting it up. Jon parts his lips instinctively.

He expects the taste of metal on Elias’ tongue; expects an echo of the metal slotted into Elias skull, still cold against the palm of his hand. Expects electricity to sting him as Elias’ teeth nip gently at his bottom lip. Expects those teeth to take the shape of solid steel, and they don’t. There is heat and saliva, a careful tongue that nudges against his own, coaxes him into responding. Elias’ thumb strokes his jaw. It’s so real. So human.

Jon tightens his grip on the back of Elias’ head, in his hair and against the scars and cold implants. He’s breathing too quickly. He thinks he might be devastated.

He wasn’t ready for it to be like this.

Elias releases him gently.

“I felt that,” he says; he’s close enough that his lips brush Jon’s, and it would be so easy just to lean back in. Not to have to hear whatever ruinous truth he wants to share. But Jon is still, and Elias is speaking. “I felt that,” he says again. “Jon, I promise you. That was real to me. Everything to do with you, everything you are and were and wish to become; those things are as real to me as the walls of my Institute and the gaze of the entity that fuels us.”

Jon lets himself be pulled in to lean his forehead against Elias’. He’s still breathing quickly; he’s both gratified and disturbed to find Elias doing the same.

“I don’t know how to handle this,” he says. His eyes are closed, and there’s no way he could force them open, even if he wanted to. “Elias, I can’t. I don’t know how.”

“Whenever you’re ready.”

“ _How?_ ”

He feels Elias’ laughter against his face. It is warm, light, and _real_. “Honestly, Jon. You handled the revelation about the Unknowing a lot better than this.”

Carefully, Jon removes his hand from Elias’ hair. He settles for gripping Elias’ shoulders, no doubt crumpling his shirt, and not caring in the slightest. He lets his weight be taken and tries not to wonder if Elias is exhibiting just a little too much unwavering strength for the average human male. If he might have made a few more upgrades beyond the chips in his brain. It doesn’t matter.

“You’ll get used to it,” Elias tells him patiently. “I’ve always found humans to be terribly resilient.” He ignores Jon’s strangled sound, inclining his head just far enough to press his lips against Jon’s forehead.

“Go back to work,” Elias says, and Jon finds himself nodding. “Take whatever time you need to process this and, when you’re ready, come and talk to me as my Archivist. I’ll answer your questions, within limits. I ask that you respect those limits. And if you decide you’re comfortable with more than just answers…we can discuss that too. Take your time.”

Slowly, Jon pulls away. He’s startled to find that his legs still have the power to support him. That his mind is still his own, already attacking the new knowledge Elias has given him. “Not too much time, I assume,” he says. “What with the Unknowing.”

“Yes,” Elias agrees. His face still carries that strange, wistful expression. He smiles, fond, as Jon attempts to tidy himself up, to little success. “And make no mistake, that is and will continue to be my first priority. Whatever our differences, I think we can both agree that an event which would essentially send humanity back to the Stone Age is…undesirable.”

“One way of putting it.” Jon turns away again. This time he makes it to the door, which hisses open in front of him, revealing the sterile grey corridor beyond it. He’ll be glad to get back to the relative safety of his office, he thinks. Maybe Martin will have an update on their missing courier.

“I’ll run a few extra scans on our systems,” Elias says to his back. “The Institute’s, and my own. If that’ll help you sleep more easily.”

“Fine,” Jon says. “Do…whatever it is you were going to do anyway.”

“My door is always open to you, Jon. Don’t be a stranger.”

Jon tells himself he’s not going to return. He repeats it ad infinitum as he enters the elevator, gripping the railing as silvery scaffolding flashes by, interspersed by brief windows of dark and endless space. His stomach roils. He can’t work out if it’s anger, relief, disappointment-anything. He doesn’t know how to feel anymore.

His mouth still tingles faintly, like an echo of electrocution, a memory of paralysing shock. He still feels cold metal under his fingertips.


End file.
